


Winter's Sleep

by Brumeier



Series: Bite Sized Fic [39]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, M/M, Prompt Fill, True Love's Kiss, Witch Curses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-05
Updated: 2016-03-05
Packaged: 2018-05-24 19:46:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6164587
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brumeier/pseuds/Brumeier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>LJ Comment Fic for Genre AU prompt: <i>MCU, Steve/any male, fairy tale AU</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Winter's Sleep

Once upon a time there was a curse, and an incredibly effective one. Steve didn’t know what they’d done to offend the witch. Maybe he’d picked a fight with the wrong person, even though everyone and everything he fought had done something wrong, something morally reprehensible; Steve didn’t battle lightly. Although it was just as likely that Bucky had been shooting off his mouth again.

Steve felt sure he could’ve remembered, if it hadn’t been so long ago. The curse had granted him eternal life, but he was doomed to live it alone. Bucky had been ripped away from him and sent into an eternal sleep, from which only True Love’s kiss could wake him. Steve had been single-mindedly looking for the place where the witch had stashed Bucky’s sleeping body, to no avail.

It was a lonely life. The friends Steve made grew old, died. There was a hole in his heart that only Bucky could fill, and he wanted nothing more than to break the curse and finally get the chance to grow old, happy and whole.

While Steve hunted for Bucky, something dark was prowling the land, always a step or two ahead of him. He heard whispers over campfires, stories told in dark corners, about a creature called the Winter Knight. In the stories he had a heart of ice, was merciless and cruel, a stealthy assassin who left no trace of himself behind. Some said his skin was made of armor; others described a black, misshapen face.

Steve found a new purpose in tracking the Winter Knight, bent on ending his reign of terror. In truth, he needed a focal point for his frustration and anger. He needed a proper foe.

It took more years than he cared to count before Steve faced the Winter Knight in battle. His long-awaited foe was nothing like he’d expected. The misshapen, black face was the result of kohl-smudged eyes and a leather mask that covered the lower half of the man’s face. And he was just a man, not an ogre or demon or dark fairy. Just a man with shining armor gauntlets and murder in his eyes. 

Neither of them spoke; they had no need of idle threats or villainous promises. They fought with fists and steel and cunning, evenly matched in almost every way. The blood was singing through Steve’s veins as he battled on, pushed to his limits and beyond, and his adversary was so worthy that Steve was almost a little sorry he couldn’t die gloriously fighting the good fight.

And then he ripped the mask off his opponent, and all the air was driven from his lungs as if he’d received a physical blow.

“Bucky?”

“Who the hell is Bucky?”

Steve saw the horrible truth in the Winter Knight’s eyes. The witch had put Bucky to sleep in his own body, and there was no sign of the man he’d once known. Was it under her direction that he committed such foul deeds?

Though he’d only frozen in place but a moment, it was the opening that the Knight needed. He struck like a snake, his hand wrapped around Steve’s throat like a vice, the edges of his gauntlet slicing into Steve’s skin and loosing rivulets of blood.

Steve was immortal, but he could feel pain. He could be killed, though it lasted but the blink of an eye. He didn’t have much time to act, but he knew what he had to do. Instead of trying to free himself from that painful, crushing grip, Steve grabbed hold of the Knight’s shoulders and pulled him closer, so that they were pressed together from chest to hip.

Steve pressed his lips to the Knight’s, which tasted of sweat and blood and leather. He remembered other, long-ago kisses. Remembered tender embraces, and the thrill of fighting trolls back to back, and promises made under the cover of darkness when they were twined together like one being with two hearts.

He felt it when the curse broke. It was as if he’d been enclosed inside a hardened shell, which cracked and fell away the moment Bucky kissed him back. It was only then that Steve realized how numb he’d been, as if he’d been the one asleep all this time.

“Steve?” Bucky pulled back and looked him, confusion and misery written on his face as clearly as an illuminated manuscript. “What have I done?”

Steve wrapped Bucky tightly in his arms. They had a long road ahead, he knew, but finally they’d be walking it together. And there was nothing they couldn’t face as long as they had each other.

And they eventually lived happily ever after.

**Author's Note:**

>  **AN:** I almost didn't post this, because of all the tell and so very little of the show. I sought out some advice from a couple different people, and one of my wise friends said that it felt more like a narrated fairy tale to have it this way. And since I really didn't want to do a rewrite, I decided to go with that. ::grins::


End file.
